G.-K.—"Me and my friends and my cousins and my aunts; certainly we stopped them—and we drubbed them too, and took them to the police station!"
British justice makes further inquiry—finds possibly sixty rupees were expended somewhere, to produce the "No witnesses." Action taken—gatekeeper removed to more important trust—honesty established.
From strength of girders, cement v. lime, foundations of piers and curves of lines, we come to ghosts at night! These too, the engineer has to consider in his day's work. Only yesterday a ghost was reported on the line! And R. told me he came down the line in a trolley in the grey of morning lately, he vouched for this, and found on the line a patroller's lamp and no one holding it, then a turban, then top cloth, then a waist cloth, and finally the owner at station, collapsed, palpitating. R. asked him what he had seen. "It was a ghost" came after him. "What was it like," said R.; "had it arms?" "No;" "Legs?" "No." "How did it get along?" He couldn't tell. It was a shape came after him. So these ghosts are positive facts here to be dealt with by superintendents and workman between them.
R.—Spoke as follows:—
"Now, my man, what I have to tell you about ghosts is this—you must remember, it is very important. These ghosts you see here that frighten you and your friends, as they have frightened you this morning, cannot so much as touch you, or even be seen by you at all if you walk between the railway lines! The iron on each side of you prevents their having the least influence over you; I will not say this about tigers or bears, but ghosts—on the word of the Sahib, they cannot touch you between the rails!" So they go away and believe in the Sahib's magic, just as they believe his magic turns out the cholera devil when he pulls their tiles down and disinfects their houses. Also they stick between the lines and consequently to their patrol work, and don't go smoking pipes by little cosy fires beside the aloes. I think R.'s prescription was fairly shrewd. Many men would merely have laughed at the men's fears, and would neither have shaken their beliefs nor given them something new to think of. That was the way the great Columba scored off the Druids and Picts. "I don't know about your astronomy or your fine music, or tales of ancestors and heroes, but I'm telling you, old Baal himself, with all his thunder and lightning, will not be so much as touching the least hair on your head if you were just to hold up this trifle of two sticks of wood. And if you do not believe me you will be burning for ever, and for evermore!"
Saturday, 23rd.—Wrote to a friend in Madras to engage rooms and walked to the European Stores; they are excellent, you can get pretty nearly everything—I even found sketch books to my taste. The roads are the things to be remembered, their breadth and splendid trees are delightful, but their length is terrible. Not again will I take a long walk in cantonments! "The 'ard 'igh road" in the west is bad enough, but when it's glaring sun on this red, hard soil, however bright and light the air, you soon get fatigued on foot.
Met D. and G. at shops, they were shopping on their own account and I on mine, for I've never found men's shopping and ladies' go well together, though for two ladies together shopping seems to be pure joy. We went to the bank to change a cheque into something suitable for travel. You have choice in India of silver rupees, value 1s. 4d., a few of which weigh about a ton, or notes. The notes are like those we get in Scotland, if you can believe me! I held out for gold, so there was a call for the Bank Manager, and a procession to the safe; of self, Manager and keys, a clerk, and three or four "velvet-footed" white-robed natives. I wish some home bankers I know could have seen the classic bungalow Bank, with its Pompeian pillars, and the waiting customers seated in the verandah, and trailing, flowery, heavy-leaved creepers with blooms of orange and white dangling from the capitals of the pillars. One of the customers waiting in the verandah was a bearded priest, with black bombazine frock and white topee; a Celt for certain by his hand and eye; and by his polite manners and intelligent expression a Jesuit, I would guess; and there were two ladies—spinsters and country bred I'd say, and poor, to judge by pale, lined faces and the look of wear about their pith hats and sun-faded dresses. Inside were white-robed figures just distinguishable at desks, their faces invisible in the deep shadow. And there was heat! and a continual "chink, chink" of counted rupees, and outside in the sun, two impatient ladies waiting in a victoria. At last we got the coin, and were faint with heat and hunger by the time we got home to lunch,—this to show the climate of Bangalore; but perhaps my readings of the temperature make it out to be hotter than it is.
… I do not write much about cooking, and the table, in these notes, do I? so just one word here, allow me.… Do not waste pity on dear friends and relatives out here on the score of food. Truly the climatic conditions are not such as so give great appetite but the food itself is excellent, beef, par example; I'd never seen better beef than the hump you get here, and the fish would be considered quite good in London, and there are various vegetables and fruits; even strawberries you can get occasionally from the hills, and then the curries are just as good as they are said to be. The best way to make them is—but space forbids!… I think the reason they are cracked up so much is because they are almost half vegetable so they suit the climate; being suitable, they have been so long practised that their making is an art that only an amateur might imitate at home.
